The quiet before the storm. The weather system of the highest severity is to hit the southern California area the following day. Almost 5-inches of rain has been forecasted for downtown Los Angeles (which is not too far away).

In the meantime, this is how our Permaculture Resort Garden is doing this Winter 2017.

Sharing with you the seeds from my Kitazawa Seed Company order.

Updated goals for 2017:
-Purchase fewer seeds
-Grow more / get better at succession planting
-Invite viewers to grow along
-Continue to work on being a better presenter

Last year, we showed and grew many heirloom plants. While they are fun to grow, yields can be iffy. As we turn our focus to crop production, we’ll be looking toward hybrid varieties.

Today’s seed order consists of hybrid varieties from a seed supplier that specializes in varieties that grow well in our warm California climate. If you’re looking for quantity seeds of Asian vegetables to grow in a warm climate, give Kitazawa Seed Company a look.

In this mini series I share with you my experience as I reacquaint myself with gong fu brewing of Dan Cong tea.

(This episode was shot shortly before the birth of my second child. The ending can use more work; and there were plans to re-shoot this episode. With a newborn, Spring planting fast approaching, and many more video topics to cover, the re-shoot won’t happen for awhile. Rather than hold this series up, we’ll go with this shoot. I hope you enjoy.)

This is a longer episode and I hope you watch the housekeeping segment. There are many videos that cover gong fu brewing (and they do a better job at it) but the housekeeping segment is one that is important and not often covered.

“The History of the Teochew People-The China History Podcast, presented by Laszlo Montgomery”

I normally grow carrots and harvest them as I need them. As the plant matures, the carrot becomes more and more dense. More mature carrots are perfect for stewing. Today, we harvest our final three ‘Red Cored Chantenay’ French heirloom carrots for Japanese curry.

Drawn by plants whose colors are so deep that they appear black, I had to grow this radish. Today, we harvest a few heirloom ‘Round Black Spanish’ radishes for dinner. This is video of our harvest.

Raw tasting: Spicy! With a nice smoldering burn.

A tour of some of the garden’s newest arrivals.

A quick update on what we did today in the garden.

We have had a couple of good months of cool weather. During this period of the year it was expected that we would find a tremendous amount of growth. Unfortunately, expectations have yet to be met.

The wasabi plant starts that we received from our first vendor are rather small. It is becoming obvious that it would take at least three years before they reach a size worth harvesting.

Remembering http://www.thewasabistore.com, and seeing how large their plant starts are, we thought that rather than calling this project that we would double down on our efforts and purchase additional plants.

Zone 10b. Southern California / Los Angeles / San Gabriel Valley

Round 2: Mounding the  ‘Tokyo Long White’ and ‘Ishikura Long Winter’ green onion plants.

Green onions / spring onions / scallions / bunching onions are either in delicious dishes or make dishes delicious. The two varieties mentioned will be grown in a side by side contest to observe how they grow.

My favorite scallions have been the Japanese heirloom varieties. Very easy to grow and can be grown year round in the southern California – Los Angeles area. Though an inexpensive produce it is the convenience of walking to the garden to find some that makes this plant worth it to grow. Moreover, fresh harvested scallion has more spring in its texture and is more aromatic.